Blood and Silver Ch. Seven

Chapter Seven

Worrywarts

Despite the uncomfortable amount of attention he was receiving from several women, Mar felt he was rather enjoying his evening. He introduced himself to Phil Snypes as an influential millionaire and philanthropist and from what he could gather based on the man’s thoughts, he liked men of considerable social standing, and Mar played on those thoughts in a believable manner without sounding grandiose. A skill developed from generations of practice. By the end of the conversation, he knew that he had gotten through to the Snypes’ list of people to look out for, even inviting him over for dinner the following weekend. He also thought that it had a good effect on his wife, Emilee, almost too good of an effect.

Within half an hour of being at the masquerade, the woman had tried to corner him a number of times. He assumed that she had scared other women into not trying to seduce him, as she seemed to be the only woman who approached him. Things came to a climax when she cornered him on the way to the bathroom.

“What can I do for you, Mrs. Snypes?” he asked. He tried to avoid looking into her grey eyes, not wanting to see the rather sexually explicit things she had in store for him.

“Who are you, Marius?” he did not give her permission to call him by his first name, even if it was a smokescreen.

“What do you mean?” he asked, keeping his voice even. He didn’t like how she was steadily moving closer to him.

“What I mean is,” she began, playing with her hair. Typical gesture, Mar thought. “How is it that you’ve been in this town without me hearing about you?” she was basically asking how there had been an above-average handsome, yet widowed, bachelor without her knowing about it.

“My daughter and I like to keep to ourselves at the best of times,” he replied politely. “You can understand how difficult it can be to maintain a social status and take care of a child at the same time is.”

Emilee Snypes frowned. “Really, I thought she seemed like an adult by now. And it’s not as if you’re one of those pathetic people who decided to have children as teenagers.”

How could this woman not be aware of just how arrogant and crass she sounded? Mar wondered. He often appeared as a twenty-five-year-old man but this was one of those occasions where he added an extra twenty years to that appearance so as to look as if he truly was the father of a nineteen-year-old woman. “Well, she just graduated last year and right now she is taking an online course before she heads off to university,” it was difficult to hide the defensiveness in his voice.

“I’m sorry, I didn’t mean any offense,” said Mrs. Snypes quickly, a little too sincere. “But you know how they can be overwhelming, and sometimes you just need an escape.” Now she was crossing the line of what he considered a comfortable distance and being too close. He had lived too many lifetimes to know the ways a desperate woman might try to satisfy their sexual desires. He raised his walking stick, preventing the woman from getting any closer.

“My daughter is not a burden, thank you very much,” her aspersions were really beginning to anger him. “Now, if you don’t mind, I would like to go find my daughter and go home.” He swept her aside gently with his walking stick, but as he made to leave, she grabbed his arm, pinning him to the wall.

“I really must be going, Mrs. Snypes,” he said unevenly.

“It’s Emilee,” she said seductively. She closed her eyes and reached up to kiss him.

“MOTHER!” a shrill scream sounded.

Oh, thank God, thought Mar as Mrs. Snypes quickly detached from him.

“Priscilla, what happened to your dress?” she demanded disdainfully. Sure enough the dress that her daughter had been wearing was provocative enough, but now most of the skirt was missing.

“My dress got caught in the back door!” she snapped indignantly. “I told I shouldn’t have bought some dress from Gamma’s!”

“Very well, then go change,” her mother said without commiseration.

Priscilla grumbled, but complied. As she walked off, Mrs. Snypes turned back to Mar.

“Now, Mrs. Snypes, if you don’t mind, I really must be going,” this time he left before she could protest. He looked into her eyes briefly and saw that he might have just made matters worse for himself as it was explicitly clear her pursuing him was not going to end here.

It did not take long to find Cass, as he found her in the back sitting with the one he assumed to be Liam Snypes. Seeing as how they were laughing with each other, he was almost reluctant to tell her that it was time to leave.

“Cassandra,” he said, almost making her jump. “Are you having an enjoyable evening, darling?”

Cass smiled brightly. “Quite so, Mar,” she replied. “Liam, this is my dad, Mar.”

Mar shifted his gaze to Liam, and smiled politely. Liam stood up and offered his hand.

“It’s a pleasure to make your acquaintance, sir,” he said.

“Manners,” Mar commented as he took the young man’s hand and shook it. “Likewise, Mr. Snypes.”

“Oh, please call me Liam,” he said, but Mar thought he heard a trace of pain somewhere in his flawless gentlemanlike behavior.

“All right, Liam, it is. My daughter here has told me about you,” Mar continued.

“Yes, sir, I see where she gets some of her charm,” Liam glanced at Cass briefly, who was clearly blushing despite her face being partially hidden by a mask.

“Why thank you, Liam. It would be a pleasure to get to know you better. Has Cass invited you over for Sunday dinner?”

“Mar, that won’t be—”

“I’d be honored, sir,” said Liam.

“Perfect, we usually have dinner around five o’clock.”

“I’ll be there.”

“Excellent, now if you don’t mind, my daughter and I really must be going.” Mar offered his hand to Cass and she took it. They left the house in almost a rush, as Mar wanted to avoid running into Mrs. Snypes. As they were driving down the road, he allowed himself to turn back into a twenty-five-year-old man.

“I’ll never grow used to how you do that, Mar,” said Cass, referring to how he visibly ages backwards twenty years.

“I can’t control the way magic works any more that I can control time,” Mar shot back. Even for a Sanguimagus, controlling time or even going back in time was the paraphernalia of fiction.

“Of course,” Cass muttered as she took off her mask. It would be morning before her scars reappeared.

A long silence followed as Mar drove them home. When they arrived, they parted for a couple of minutes as they changed out of their priceless clothing. Mar let his hair fall loose. He shed his clothing and changed into his nightwear and robe and went into the living room. To give the room a little warmth, he went over to the fireplace and tapped the mantle thrice with his walking stick. Instantly, a fire burst to life illuminating the room that was otherwise dark with the exception of the large window dominating the adjacent wall letting in the pale moonlight that was somewhat obscured by the tall trees that surrounded the house. Cass soon joined him as he sat down in his leather armchair.

She was wearing her favorite geisha robe that he bought for her as a souvenir when they visited Japan for her graduation. That was probably the happiest he had ever seen her, especially when he took her to Tokyo Disneyland. Upon their return to the states, she returned to her usual melancholy demeanor. She sat down in her armchair across from his.

“How was your evening, my dear?” asked Mar.

“It was…better than I thought it would be,” replied Cass, as she pushed a strand of hair out of her eyes.

“It seemed as though you were having an enjoyable evening based on what I saw with that Liam,” he teased.

Cass curled her lip in sarcastic humor. “Very funny, but yes, I was enjoying my time with him.”

“How would you describe him based on these few hours you spoke to him?”

Cass bit her lip as she thought. “Shadowy?”

“How so?”

“Well what I mean is, he was more interested in learning about me than he was about telling me about himself.”

“Well, haven’t I told you that it is an important social skill to make inquiries before you go on speaking about yourself?”

Cass cocked her head as she gave him a quizzical look. “Marcellus, you have been drilling every possible skill known to man to make me a well-mannered individual; of course I did just that. I was following those guidelines, but when I asked questions regarding his person, he seemed very keen on keeping his answers very brief, almost to the point of being unnecessarily vague.”

“And why does that concern you so?”

Cass hesitated. “I don’t know, he just has that look.”

“What look?”

“The look that suggests that there is more to him than what he is telling me; it’s like there is some inner pain of his that he is trying very hard to keep hidden. I know because for a time I had that same look.”

A long silence followed where the two of them contemplated their words. Mar knew all too well the look that she spoke of. Throughout much of her childhood, she had remained emotionally traumatized by what her parents did to her and often tried to hid it under a thick veil of flawless manners and sheer kindness. However, through all that time, they both knew that it was a smokescreen for her pain.

“Are you sure this is not just something based off of—” began Mar, but Cass cut him off.

“His sister made the implication that he is not living under a roof,” she blurted out.

Mar gazed intently into the green eyes of his adoptive daughter. “All right, I’ll believe what you are saying, but in the meantime could you do something for me?”

“Anything,” replied Cass.

“While you get to know him more, do not press the subject of his familial issues; allow him to come to you about them.”

Cass nodded her compliance. “You want to watch a movie?”

Mar allowed a chuckle to escape his lips. “Of course, my dear.” He tapped his walking stick thrice upon the mantelpiece. This time, the large television screen that sat above it turned on and went straight to their Blu-ray menu. “Out of all the silly inventions of the twentieth century, the television was probably one of the better ones,” he reminisced as he got up to sit on the massive half-circle couch so he could face the screen comfortably. As Cass came over to join him, he wagged his fingers and a neatly folded quilt flew out of a cupboard next to the fireplace and floated over to them.

“Is there a particular film that you had in mind, sweetheart?” asked Mar as he covered them up.

“Les Misérables,” replied Cass as she snuggled up against him.

Mar chuckled as he tapped his walking stick, causing the disk to fly out of its case and into the player.